Hosted by the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute and Classical Uprising, The Voices of Women in Ancient Literature is a free public lecture exploring women’s perspectives, agency, and storytelling in classical texts such as The Odyssey. Featuring Barbara Weiden Boyd of Bowdoin College, the lecture provides historical and literary context for the upcoming Portland Bach Experience performance of Penelope by Sarah Kirkland Snider. Attendance is free, includes a concert discount code, and space is limited to 50 participants.

Inspired by Homer's epic poem, the Odyssey, Penelope is a meditation on what it means to come home. A song cycle by composer Sarah Kirkland Snider and lyricist Ellen McLaughlin, Penelope, sees a woman's husband appear at her door after an absence of twenty years, suffering from brain damage. A veteran of an unnamed war, he doesn't know who he is and she doesn't know who he's become. While they wait together for his return to himself, she reads to him from the Odyssey, and in the journey of that book, she finds a way into her former husband's memory. Penelope is a love story about the long work of finding each other again. SCHEDULE 5:00 p.m. – Doors 5:15 p.m. – Pre-concert lecture (concert ticket required) 6:00 p.m. – Performance